Category Archives: Version control

If you are programming, and you are still not using any form of version control, you really have no excuse. There are many benefits to being able to keep track of your code and try out various branches, even if you are the only programmer in the project. If you are collaborating with someone, it soon becomes nearly impossible (or at least very time-consuming) to deal with various versions and changes.

Of all the version control systems I’ve tried over the years (CVS, Subversion, a little bit of Mercurial, and Git) it seems that Git has “won” in a sense. There is a sizable open-source community born around GitHub (and Bitbucket) for which Git works very well indeed. Also many programming tools have built-in or plug-in support for Git, so you don’t even have to use command-line tools for managing your source code repositories if you don’t want to.

For open-source development, GitHub is the obvious choice. If you’re doing closed source, or you think your code isn’t ready for public scrutiny, Bitbucket gives you unlimited private repositories. I’m currently using GitHub to collaborate on some private repositories, which you can get with a paid plan, and Bitbucket for my closed-source app projects.

In a spirited attempt to really learn to use the tools of my trade, I wanted to take some time to better learn Git for version control (and also dive deeper into Xcode, but that is another story).

Earlier I’ve occasionally been using the fine tome Version Control with Git, 2nd Edition* by Jon Loeliger and Matthew McCullough to learn the basics, but I wanted to really dive in. I’ve already mastered the very basics, and have also used remote repositories with both GitHub and BitBucket, but there is a lot more to learn to be able to really take advantage of Git.

* Disclaimer: I’m an O’Reilly affiliate, and the links above take you to the O’Reilly online bookstore, in the hope that you purchase something, so that I will get a small commission.